MADISON, WI, August 19, 2020 /24-7PressRelease/ -- Marquis Who's Who, the world's premier publisher of biographical profiles, is proud to present Stephen L. Vaughn with the Albert Nelson Marquis Lifetime Achievement Award. An accomplished listee, Dr. Vaughn celebrates many years' experience in his professional network, and has been noted for achievements, leadership qualities, and the credentials and successes he has accrued in his field. As in all Marquis Who's Who biographical volumes, individuals profiled are selected on the basis of current reference value. Factors such as position, noteworthy accomplishments, visibility, and prominence in a field are all taken into account during the selection process.
Having earned the title of a professor emeritus at the University of Wisconsin, Madison (UW-Madison), Professor Vaughn notably taught history in the School of Journalism and Mass Communication for more than three and a half decades, retiring in 2017. A specialist in late 19th and 20th century U.S. history, he also had an affiliated appointment in the University's Department of History. Vaughn's research interests have focused on the intersection of politics, social life and communication history, and over the course of his career, he interviewed several notable figures including Presidents Richard Nixon and Ronald Reagan. His writings have explored such topics as the history and social impact of new media, the history of journalism and censorship, and the significance of the entertainment industry in American culture and particularly in the career of Ronald Reagan.
Vaughn earned his doctorate in 1977 at Indiana University, Bloomington, under the mentorship of the prolific presidential historian Robert H. Ferrell. Shortly after acquiring his Ph.D., he began his teaching career as a visiting assistant professor at Indiana University. He subsequently became the historical assistant for the Organization of American Historians in Bloomington and served briefly as its acting executive secretary in 1982. Additionally, Dr. Vaughn was the associate editor for the Journal of American History in Bloomington between 1979 and 1980. Before joining the faculty at UW-Madison, Vaughn also spent one year as a visiting assistant professor at the University of Oregon.
A prolific writer, Dr. Vaughn has published numerous books and articles, Vaughn's Holding Fast the Inner Lines (1980), which Princeton University's Arthur S. Link called "a superb book and a major contribution to the literature of recent American history," dealt with United States propaganda during World War I. Vaughn's Ronald Reagan in Hollywood: Movies and Politics (I994) was the result of ten years of research. There was a strong connection, Vaughn argued, between Reagan's film career at Warner Bros. and the Reagan presidency's later emphasis on strengthening the country's national defense, stimulating a patriotic revival, and encouraging a resurgence of American capitalism. Freedom and Entertainment (2006), which reviewers called "a fascinating and carefully researched book" into the "secretive workings of the motion picture industry's rating system," explored how new technologies since the 1960s made the presentations of sex and violence in films more explicit than in the past. Vaughn's forthcoming book, The Age of New Media, 1875-1930, is about the origins of our modern world's fascination with celebrities; its embrace of music, color, and life in the moment; and the challenges that new media pose to literacy, privacy, and democracy.
During Vaughn's career, he edited several works. The Vital Past (1985) was a collection of articles on the value of history in an era of present-mindedness. The Encyclopedia of American Journalism (2008) contained more than 400 essays on the history of the Fourth Estate. Vaughn was also associate editor for Dictionary of American History Supplement (1996) and co-editor of Science in Print (2012). The latter volume was published under the auspices of UW-Madison's Center for the History of Print and Digital Culture of which Vaughn was a founding member. In addition, Vaughn was editor and compiler of an annotated bibliography of about 4,500 titles entitled New Communication Technologies: Their History and Social Influence (2010), an online work published by the University of Wisconsin Libraries.
After receiving a Bachelor of Arts at Southeast Missouri State University in 1968, and a Master of Arts the following year from Indiana University, Vaughn served in the U.S. Army between 1969 and 1971. After he returned to graduate school, he received a Rotary International Fellowship to study for a year at the University of Toronto before finishing his doctorate at Indiana. At Wisconsin, Vaughn was a Vilas Associate Scholar and won numerous research grants including from the National Endowment for the Humanities and the American Philosophical Society. He also received two Fulbright Awards, one in 1987 to teach at Tashkent University in central Asia, which was then part of the former Soviet Union, the other a distinguished chair at the University of Bologna in Italy, which he declined. In 2008, Vaughn received an Alumni Merit Award from his alma mater Southeast Missouri State University.
In his youth, Vaughn was an accomplished athlete. After graduating from high school in 1964, he was offered a bonus contract to play professional baseball after taking batting practice with the St. Louis Cardinals. At Southeast Missouri State, he set a school batting record as a freshman, and subsequently was drafted by the Chicago White Sox and earned All-American honors. During the summers, he made all-star teams in both the Cape Cod League and Central Illinois Collegiate League where his teammates and opponents included future major leaguers Joe Niekro and Thurman Munson. He later became an avid handball player and won 15 state titles and three national titles including a gold medal at the 1997 Senior Olympics in Tucson, Arizona.
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